The message is muddled, Boris
Once again we are facing a week in lockdown.
This is hard, and I’m sure listening to politicians like myself talk about how hard it is has started to become tiresome, so I’ll just briefly say that we’re seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and we simply cannot throw away all the progress we’ve made.
Despite muddled messaging from the UK Government, in Scotland it is still the law – as well as our personal responsibility – that we all must stay home, protect the NHS and save lives.
The UK Government had a bad week when it came to communications. We all now know how it went wrong by this point.
Number 10 insiders decided to brief the Sunday papers that their messaging strategy would change from the very clear and very impactful “Stay at Home. Protect the NHS. Save lives” to the vague and fluffy “Stay alert. Control the virus. Save lives”.
The devolved government first heard about the change in messaging from the media and it sparked a very quick reaction, with the First Minster making clear the message in Scotland hadn’t changed, and the Welsh and Northern Irish governments both making similar statements.
Boris Johnson delivered a 13-minute address to the nation where he stated that he was the Prime Minister of all nations in the United Kingdom, but didn’t bother to mention that the change he was making to lockdown procedure affected England only.
The address was messy and, frankly, very problematic.
There’s been plenty of discussion and discourse around the change, and the morals of asking working-class people to walk to work and avoid public transport to make money for billionaires to hoard.
Messaging from political leaders is always incredibly important, but never more so than at a time like this. The muddled messaging of the past week or so cannot continue from the UK Government.
Myself and my SNP colleagues continue to challenge the government on the array of shortcomings in the various schemes announced due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
I continue to be contacted by constituents who have issues with furlough, issues with social distancing measures in the workplace, newly-employed workers, seasonal workers, zero-hour contract workers and freelance workers. The list goes on.
The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and the Self Employment Income Support Scheme have many flaws that are leaving millions of people either applying for Universal Credit or with absolutely nothing.
The government must make some sort of appeals process available to those who have been left devastated by lack of access to these schemes and those missing out on technicalities. This needs to be addressed urgently.
I find it incredibly odd that the government would slightly increase Universal Credit due to the Covid-19 outbreak but would choose to neglect doing the same with Employment Support
Allowance (ESA).
Many in receipt of ESA will be shielding at the moment and any extra support they can receive after a decade of Tory austerity and a five-year freeze on their benefits would be welcome for them, I am sure.
I asked about this recently at Prime Ministers Questions, and I must say the answer I received was absolutely ridiculous and in no way was an answer to this question.
I have written to the Prime Minister asking him to address this.
I will not, however, be holding my breath for any sort of reasonable response.